RHT How To:
Four Reasons Why You Need a Home NetworkBy Bryan Dailey
April 2004

If you live in a major metropolitan area, it seems like the Internet is
everywhere. You can’t go into a Starbucks without seeing the signs
promoting the fact that they offer a wireless Internet connection so
you can sip some latte and surf the Net on your laptop. Wireless
networks are popping up at airports, laundromats, and even bowling
alleys nationwide. At home, you likely have an Internet connection in
your den, office or maybe your bedroom, but as wireless networks become
more affordable and easier to set up, you now have the ability to
utilize the Internet in your home theater system in ways you might
never have thought possible. This month, we look at four reasons why
you should have an Internet network throughout your home.

1. Network Connectivity For Your Home TheaterAudio/video
components are becoming more advanced and computer-like. Instead of
having a piece of gear that has a limited lifespan, many new AV
preamps, DVD players and receivers now have the ability to have their
software and firmware upgraded. Software-based upgrades can help
prevent obsolescence in the future and make your life easier in the
present, so that you’ll be glad you have a network connection in your
home theater system. Imagine you have just bought the biggest, baddest
new AV preamp, but six months later, you are at your wits’ end because
it is acting strangely. It turns out that the manufacturer found a
major glitch in the operating system and is offering a replacement
version of the software. Someday soon, it may be possible to allow the
manufacturer or your AV installer to access the gear in your network
remotely via an Internet connection to perform the software reinstall.
Without a network connection in your system, you may have to remove the
preamp from your system and lug it over to your computer to download
the new software, or even worse, send it back to the dealer or
manufacturer. If you think this sounds like a pipe dream, consider the
fact that home automation systems from companies like AMX and Crestron
currently allow dealers to control their clients’ systems remotely. The
ability to have remote access to your individual components for
installs, upgrades and troubleshooting can’t be far behind.

There
may come a day when copy-protected HDTV feeds of current feature films
will be piped into your home theater on a pay-per-view basis. Video and
audio post-production houses use high-speed Internet connections to
transfer video and sound files back and forth to various locations
around the world, and many movie theaters with digital projection
systems are doing this as well. If the day comes when movie and
television content is distributed this way, you’ll be glad that you
planned ahead with a network connection installed in your home theater
system.

Music servers are becoming more popular and
it’s not unheard of for a die-hard music fan to log on to his or her
home music server from work to listen to a music collection remotely at
the office. If you know the IP address of your friend’s music server
and have the proper authority, you could log on to his or her server
and listen to your friend’s collection remotely as well. If you have
ever used Napster or the Gnutella network in the past, it is the same
concept. However, in this case, you are accessing a specific computer
rather than a worldwide network.

2. Using Your TiVo As a Media ServerYou’re
going to be stuck at the office late and, on your way to work, you
realize that you forgot to set the TiVo to record Monday Night
Football. If you have a new Generation 2 TiVo with the Home Media
option and it is hooked up to the Internet, you won’t have to rely on
calling your next-door neighbor to go set your TiVo. With TiVo’s Home
Media option (a $99 one-time fee), you can log onto your TiVo from any
computer that is connected to the Internet and can tell it what shows
to record. From the first day I installed a TiVo in my system, I longed
for this feature. I knew it was just a matter of time before you’d be
able to hook the TiVo up to the Internet and schedule show recording
remotely.

TiVo is pretty much a simple computer with
a Linux operating system that is hooked up to your television instead
of a computer monitor. Computer geeks and TiVo enthusiasts have created
an impressive amount of software and hardware to tweak out and modify
the device, but even if you don’t feel like taking on the challenge of
installing a bigger hard drive or learning how to output the signal of
your TiVo so that you can burn DVDs of your favorite show, you can put
your TiVo on the Internet and enjoy features that most users fail to
utilize. Besides remote scheduling of shows on the Internet, the TiVo
Home Media option allows multi-room viewing (requiring more than one
Series 2 TiVo unit), gives you the ability to use your TiVo as a
jukebox to play your MP3 collection off of your computer and the
ability to store and view your digital photos on your TV through the
TiVo. There are better ways to accomplish all of these tasks, but not
everyone has the money and resources to get a dedicated music server
and a dedicated video sever, so the TiVo home media option allows the
user to have a multi-media server in the home for a fraction of the
price of the high-end systems that you see featured every month in
RevolutionHomeTheater.com.

3. Surfing The Net Throughout Your HouseIf
you have a high-speed Internet connection in your home, chances are,
you use the Internet more than the average person does. Although most
Internet service providers (ISPs) do not technically support splitting
your Internet connection to share throughout your home, they realize
that it is a popular new consumer phenomenon. The days of people having
just one computer in their home are fading, especially with the
popularity of laptop computers and wireless Internet capable PDAs. By
networking your Internet connection throughout your home, you can enjoy
your high-speed connection in as many different rooms as you’d like, as
long as you have enough computers, enough ports on your router and
additional expansion hubs, if necessary.

If
you opt for a wireless connection, you’ll enjoy even more freedom as
you tote your laptop around the house with you and plop down on the
couch in front of the TV. I didn’t feel the need to have a laptop
computer until adding a wireless network to my home. Now I can be
anywhere in the house and can check sports scores, download email or
make sure the RevolutionHomeTheater.com server is working properly. A
major benefit of running a wireless connection in your home in the fact
that you won’t have to worry about the expense of tearing open walls or
pulling up the carpet to install unsightly cables throughout your home.

4. Online GamingVideo
games are fun to play with your friends when they come over, but what
if your favorite gaming buddy lives halfway across the country? Playing
games online is not a new concept, but only recently has the technology
advanced far enough that is actually makes sense to invest in a
PlayStation 2, XBox or GameCube in order to play games online. The game
systems have always been great, but now with more and more people
having high-speed Internet in their homes, the amount of people gaming
online has increased dramatically.

Each of the
gaming consoles has its own hardware that is required, and sometimes a
subscription fee is likewise required to access online gaming networks,
so you’ll want to do some in-depth research to find out what system is
best for your needs if you want to get into the world of online gaming.
I have played countless hours of EA Sports’ NBA Live 2003 against
friends of mine online with our Sony PlayStations and have played many
a game of Microsoft’s NFL Fever 2004 against total strangers using my
XBox. I have hardwired my game systems, but wireless solutions for most
of the game systems are available.

Wired or Wireless & 802.11b or 802.11g?Many
people are already convinced that they need to have their high-speed
Internet connection networked throughout their homes, but don’t know
how to go about doing it. AudioRevolution.com publisher Jerry Del
Colliano recently rewired the speaker wires in his home and while the
walls were torn open, he ran enough Cat 5 Ethernet wire throughout his
walls to hog-tie a small army. He now has his high-speed cable modem
connections available at several outlets in the house and, with a short
Cat 5 extension cord, he can take a laptop into the bedroom, office or
kitchen and hook up to any of the Internet connection points in the
house. This is the best way to go if you want to have an ultra-fast
connection that is free of the security risks that wireless networks
face, but there are a few downsides to the hardwired in-wall
installation. With a hardwired connection in the wall, branching out
from a router, you don’t need to worry about running encryption that
prevents your neighbors from stealing your signal, but if a cord goes
bad or a mouse gets into the wall and chews on a cord, you are going to
lose that connection until you get inside the walls and replace it.

I
had installed a small network in my last apartment and since I was just
renting the place, I ran wires from the main router in the master
bedroom to the living room and the second bedroom under the carpet.
This was not as slick as running the wires in the walls and terminating
them at outlets at the wall, but back in 1998, the fact that I even had
a home network put me way ahead of the curve technologically. When I
moved into a townhouse that I recently purchased, I decided that
computer networking had advanced enough and the prices had become so
reasonable that I wanted to explore the option of installing an 802.11a
or 802.11b wireless network. When I installed my wireless network a
year and a half ago, the dilemma of whether or not to get 802.11a or b
had just about faded. The differences between the two are significant,
but rather than get mired down in the details of the two, I’ll just
tell you that by the time I installed my network, 802.11b had pretty
much emerged as the standard. The original Macintosh AirPort card was
an 802.11b unit, so it was a no-brainer that I’d use this format for my
wireless network.

As nice and convenient as the
802.11b wireless network is to have, anyone who has surfed the web on a
hardwired network longs for the blazing speed that 802.11b just cannot
offer, especially when being run encrypted to prevent hackers from
getting into the network and monkeying with your files. The answer to
this problem is called 802.11g. If your brain is now spinning from all
this “A”, “B” and “G” talk, here is the simple breakdown. 802.11g is
about five times faster than 802.11b (approximately 11mbps vs. 54mbps,
respectively), but is more expensive. Modern computers are starting to
support the 802.11g standard (i.e., Apple’s Airport Extreme is a fancy
way of saying 802.11g-compatible) and the prices of the routers, cards
and hubs you will need are already falling, so I highly recommend going
with 802.11g. If you already have an 802.11b wireless router and
network cards for your computer, you can be assured that 802.11g is
backwards-compatible to 802.11b.

There is a huge selection of hardwired and wireless routers on the
market today. Flip through the ads in the Sunday paper for companies
like Best Buy, CompUSA or Circuit City, and you’ll see great prices on
the equipment that you’ll need to network your computer. For $200 or
less, you can network several computers. If you are not computer savvy,
it may be a bit of a struggle to get your network set up, but
manufacturers such as D-Link, Linksys and NETGEAR all offer phone
support for a period of time after purchasing your equipment and this
will usually help you solve 95 percent of the problems that you may
have when setting up a network. Enlisting the help of a
technically-minded friend is another way to go, but the best way is to
jump in feet first and try to learn how to do it yourself. Remember to
read the instructions. This isn't rocket science, but if you've never
done it before, you likely won’t be able to wing it. Before you know
it, you’ll learn how to set up your router, block unwanted users and
absorb many other tricks that will allow you to enjoy your Internet
connection throughout your home in ways that you may never before have
imagined possible.